Social Accounts

Each year or at the end of mentoring we ask our Mentees, Mentors, carers and teachers for feedback on the progression of the Mentee throughout the year. These questions are based on the aims the organisation looks to achieve through mentoring, and enables us to create a mentoring journey for the young person.

Last year we mentored 364 distressed and vulnerable young people and worked with 82 schools. Thank you to all our mentors for their valuable work and the schools that we provide a service to. Here are our results with the pick of some fabulous feedback (names changed where necessary):

EBSA Mentoring Feedback:

I’d like to say thank you to Chris for helping me and giving me coping strategies. I’ve really enjoyed our sessions and I’m now looking forward to starting college.

Mentee

Yes, this is a great service for young people. Schools do not have the resources to support young people when they are struggling. The Mentor Link process was simple and stress free. Chris is a lovely man and J has really enjoyed spending time with him. He has helped J to get through his GCSEs stress free and J is now looking forward to the next chapter in his life. Thank you to you all but especially thank you to Chris for your time.

Parent

He did come in last week to complete his SATS. It was for a couple of hours a day, but he did fantastically well. We hope this will help, and we will see him this week. Keeping everything crossed…We have been discussing him this morning in our KS2 safeguarding meeting and we can see huge progress from where we started.

Teacher

It is a pleasure to mentor E, over the past sessions she has relaxed more, she is very witty and shares her sense of humour with me. She now uses good eye contact and does not chew her cardigan as frequently. We use mood cards to discuss feelings and our attitudes discussing what makes us both anxious and what is the best way to deal with it…and we chat about different things, she does not start the conversations but now she answers in sentences rather than a yes or no.

Mentor

The support that has been provided by yourselves has been amazing and an integral part of supporting M back into education. Many thanks.

Teacher

She is more confident speaking to myself (class teacher) and other support staff. She is happy to engage with Mentor where previous professionals have not had such luck!

Teacher

L presents as much happier in school. She gets on very well with her group of friends and there don’t appear to be any fall-outs. She makes much more positive eye contact with adults, and smiles much more readily. L’s commitment to and contribution to the Class 8 play in July was phenomenal. She even agreed to take on all four performances when a friend felt overwhelmed. Mainly I celebrate the smile L gives me when I say the register – it’s very genuine and almost always there now.

Teacher

When we phoned Mentor Link to find out about your service you were happy to give it a try not knowing whether it would work and we really appreciate the time and support that Mentor Link has given us. Thank you.

Parent

We feel that the support provided through the sessions with Janet has met the intended need, and we’ve seen an improvement in B’s attitude and attendance. Thank you again for your continued support and for the positive impact this intervention has had.

Teacher

Mentee Feedback:

I have more confidence around my friends and people I haven’t met before.

Adults can teach children not to back down from their fear and give them lots of encouragement.

I didn’t have friends before these sessions. I used to stay alone and not talk to anyone, and I also used to come late to school every day because I didn’t have any hope to come to school. But after the sessions things became much better! I got friends, everyone started to talk to me. I stay really happy now. Also, I feel more confident and proud of myself, and I come to school on time every day because I have hope to come to school, and see my friends.

I have found my Mentor Link sessions with Mrs Whitehouse very helpful and supportive. Mrs Whitehouse has helped me with everything really with school related things, future plans, college, my health and wellbeing, and everything to be fair. Especially with school, college and academic stuff and talking through what’s on my mind from major to minor, my appointment sessions cover all areas for me and supports all my needs which has helped me with my confidence and outlook on life. I like Mrs Whitehouse, I get on well with her, she is easy to talk to, she understands my struggles and challenges and I always look forward to our appointment sessions. Thank you Mrs Whitehouse and thank you Mentor Link.”

He’s helped me be a bit more happier and get out of my comfort zone at certain places like school and football. He’s done a good job and I’ve definitely improved.

A message received from one of our Mentors Simon recently, many years after mentoring:

Hi Simon, This might be a far fetched message, I don’t know if you remember me. I’m Y, you used to counsel me in sixth form, well since then I did my A Levels, got a First class in my degree, and now work as a paralegal at a solicitor’s firm. I’ve felt low recently and learnt to appreciate the good in life. This is a message just to say thank you, for how much you helped me in my life I never extended gratitude to you. You have my number should you need me for legal reasons, I practise all law bar crime! We should meet up sometime for a coffee! Yours sincerely, Y.

I enjoy talking to my Mentor and the activities that we do.

This service has helped me and also my friends that speak to you too.

I think there is a need for this service because there would be many of other children like me who would not have friends or somebody to talk with. I think every single person needs this session.

I feel this service is able to help younger people like me get through difficult school years.

Mentor Feedback:

I am really enjoying mentoring at Honeybourne Primary School. This is my first placement and I couldn’t have asked for a better school or mentee to start with. The contacts at school are really wonderful and make me feel welcome. I am enjoying it so much that I volunteered for another placement. I feel the role has turned out to be a lot more rewarding and eye opening which I am enjoying immensely. I feel totally supported…Wendy is great. I feel as though I could tell her anything which is great in this situation. She regularly checks up on me and it makes me feel confident in my role as mentor.

My Mentee really looks forward to the sessions and the teachers/support teaching assistant tell me this regularly. I feel we have developed a relationship which is helping her by showing her a positive way to act and respect people. Every week it is getting more positive, and the disruptive behaviour has got less the more we are developing the relationship.

My Mentee has said to me that she really likes me coming to see her because I’m always happy to see her. I feel this has had a really positive effect on her because she doesn’t feel a lot of people are happy to see her. I had an eye operation and when I went to my mentor session she was excellent in ‘looking after me’ as she put it. This showed that she had empathy and is developing a caring nature.

I feel this is a great organisation and I am regularly saying to people I know that they need to get in touch to become a mentor. It is so rewarding but also fun and you learn so much about people and yourself.

D has been open about appreciating the opportunity to talk to a Mentor instead of bottling up his feelings. He is much more communicative about things.

A mentioned that she no longer gets detention for arriving late to school as we talked about how she could improve this. With this she feels a sense of achievement and is proud of working at this. She has also now formed friendships for which she has shared her joy. She seems much more confident within herself now compared to the initial meeting.

His attendance has started to improve since school have put pressure on his parents to improve attendance. His is much more talkative and open about confidence issues. He is also more accepting and understanding about the situation with his father, and discusses his relationship with him very honestly and openly with me. I am currently trying to encourage him about the importance of school work and engaging with his teachers!

Thank you for allowing me to be a small part of your wonderful team.

T is maturing into a lovely, polite young man. He is in year 10, and we are going to spend part of our hourly sessions on GCSE work, specifically Maths and English.

I have been seeing this pupil since November 2023. Naturally there have been some fluctuations in that time (e.g. some anxiety about GCSEs at the moment which is natural), however, the general trend has been overwhelmingly positive with TJ showing many signs of greater maturity (politeness and thoughtfulness), communicating more naturally, and his peer group relationships seem more solid and he is really engaging with the support staff.

J has shown a good improvement from a lad who was very quiet and reserved to a position where he shows good activity in our sessions.

It’s early days but the move to college seems to be suiting him and he is showing signs of increased maturity. He seems to be applying himself to his course, and hopefully he will get a good result when he takes his maths GCSE.

L’s transformation is stark. He is now “a man with a plan”. He now showers everyday – because a good positive start makes for a better day – tidies up after himself and helps out around the home. He assists with washing-up, does some cooking, does some baking and helps with tidying up. Through our homework ‘challenges’, he also now asks “How was your day, Mum?”, and they have a chat most evenings. As per L they get on so much better and from what I can interpret, their relationship strains are no longer an issue! L is a lad who just needed a bit of a guiding hand and a (male) role model. Someone to push him, challenge him, support him and just as importantly congratulate him on his successes. There have been quite a few successes along the way, and to see his proud smile when I say “well done” and “I’m proud of you” etc, it’s like watching the lad grow before my eyes. In my time with L, he has done a lot of maturing, both physically and mentally. He is a fantastic lad who has gone from hiding under his fringe with no eye contact, to a young man who (whilst still a bit shy & nervous) sits up straight, has good body language, who speaks much more clearly and with a good level of confidence and assuredness. Through our discussions we also got L thinking about his future and what his life might look like when his time at Wyre Forest school comes to an end. This is where Mentorlink has been such a joy for me as a Mentor; L is now signed up to go on a life-skills course at Kidderminster college, as he has shown an interest in maybe working in a retail shop or coffee-shop in the future. To give you an idea of how his confidence has grown and how his personality has developed, when I’ve asked him how he feels about going to college; starting the new course and having to get to know new people? I was expecting words such as ‘scared’ or worried or daunted etc. Instead, he said he was ‘keen and excited’. L signing up for this course without any help from me – just him & his mum – and to then use the word ‘excited’ about attending same, were highlight moments for me in our time together. I personally used the word ‘bursting’ to describe the feelings of pride & joy I have felt when sharing in this success of L’s.

Teacher Feedback:

We are delighted with the support offered to our young person.

Peter is absolutely amazing and doing a fantastic job supporting C. The young person looks forward to his sessions with Peter each week and clearly sees him as a very important and trusted person in his life. The consistency, patience, and encouragement Peter provides has made a real difference.

Peter also communicates exceptionally well with our team—he is always prompt, reliable, and keeps us updated, which we really value and appreciate. His ongoing support has had a positive impact on C’s confidence and emotional wellbeing.

Thank you again for the work Mentor Link does, and we’d be more than happy to have a conversation about how we can work more closely together in the future.

Have a wonderful summer and thank you again for all of the amazing work you and your team do to support our pupils.

One of my Year 11 students at Tewkesbury School has been seeing a Mentor Link mentor for about a year I think and the feedback from the and the school has been overwhelmingly positive. Keep up the good work! (Education Advisor from the Virtual School).

C has become the School Prime Minister having been voted for by his peers and having had the confidence to stand for this position. This is something he would have contemplated previously.

Attendance has improved: 4.6% increase in attendance compared to this time last academic year.

The child’s behaviour in school became more controlled and he was more responsive to guidance from the school. He was able to articulate his feelings and seek help when he needed it. I think this is a fantastic charity and one we would be keen to work with again.

Roger who comes to see H weekly has been superb with H who always shows up for these sessions. Roger is calm, understanding and supportive with and has always shared any concerns for him.

C has a much better relationship with staff which was a major problem. Tom has helped C have aspirations post 16. We are delighted by what Tom brings to our students.

A has settled better in lessons and his attendance has improved. A is nearly always here on a Friday because of his meeting with Tom when it used to be his least favourite day. A seems happier in himself than before he started with Mentor Link.

It is a huge win – M has successfully transitioned to secondary school and although her anxiety is a daily struggle for her she is attending well.

M often shows her gratitude for the support she receives, and when in school you can see she now has the confidence to seek out trusted adults to speak to if she is anxious or upset.